


Keep me where the light is

by smaragdbird



Category: Marvel (Movies), The Avengers (2012)
Genre: F/F, Hurt/Comfort
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-04-06
Updated: 2012-04-06
Packaged: 2017-11-03 03:54:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 683
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/376901
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/smaragdbird/pseuds/smaragdbird
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Darcy comforts Natasha when she comes back from an undercover mission</p>
            </blockquote>





	Keep me where the light is

**Author's Note:**

> Written for [this](http://norsekink.livejournal.com/3415.html?thread=8843863) prompt on .

Coulson called her to let her know that they were back. No details, of course, but his tone alone told her that it had been bad. She wondered sometimes if it was easier for Coulson to take care of Clint when he knew all the details, everything that happened on these undercover missions Natasha and Clint never talked about.

No, she decided when Natasha came into their flat, body coiled tight and tense to the point of breaking, knowing wouldn’t make it easier at all. It would probably make it worse.

“Hey”, Darcy said softly.

“I need to get these off”, Natasha gestured to her hair, blonde instead of red, and clothes, too skimpy and cheap compared to what she usually wore.

“I know, baby”, She led Natasha to the bathroom. She had run the bath as soon as Coulson had called her. Natasha shed her clothes on the floor and Darcy threw them away before Natasha had to say anything.

“I’ll do your hair, okay?” She asked, sitting down on the edge of the bath. Natasha nodded, slowly relaxing in the warm water as Darcy started to work the red dye in.

“Thor’s getting better at cooking”, she told Natasha as she carefully combed her hair to spread the dye better. “Like, really, really good. He’s making pancakes tomorrow so you can judge for yourself.”

“If it’s not with cinnamon, it’s not pancakes”, Natasha muttered.

“I’ll be sure to tell him that”, Darcy smiled. She pinned Natasha’s hair up to keep it out of the water and washed her hands in the sink before sitting down next to the bath, wrapping her hand around Natasha’s.

“By the way, two, for now unknown persons have conducted an unannounced and unauthorized test on Shield’s security systems. Highest bets are on Tony and Coulson, followed by Stark and Phil.”

“You’re making that up.”

“Nope.”

“Phil and Tony are like cats and dogs.”

“I swear to you as soon as no one’s looking they drop all the threats of tazering and insults and become BFF’s. There ‘s some universe out there where they already conquered the Earth.”

“Never”, but for the first time a small smile appeared on Natasha’s face. Darcy leaned over and kissed her softly.

“Maria wants to reassign them to Antarctica but Fury didn’t let her.” She squeezed Natasha’s fingers. “Steve’s decided to go to art school, part-time, or rather Bucky talked him into it. And Bruce watched nothing but that Russian cartoon you told him about. Bucky was quite impressed with how quickly he picked up the language.”

Natasha just lay there and listened to her which was perfectly fine for Darcy since she knew that as long as she talked there was no silence that could be filled with memories from the mission. It was their ritual to make Natasha come back into her world, into her own self. So Darcy talked about all the gossip and the changes and everything else that came to her mind and continued to do so even when Natasha turned on the shower to wash the dye from her hair.

Darcy had already laid out clothes for her, Darcy’s clothes, clothes that smell like her like Darcy’s college t-shirt and an old pair of drawstring trousers that she had since highschool.

Another part of their ritual.

“See”, Darcy said, combing through Natasha’s red locks in front of the bathroom mirror, “all is at it should be.”

“Thanks”, Natasha replied, leaning back against Darcy’s chest tiredly.

“What else do you need?”

“You. And about forty hours of sleep.”

Darcy smiled. “I think we can do that.”

Once they were in bed, Natasha wrapped herself around Darcy, almost clinging to her. Darcy stroked her hair and hummed her favourite song of the moment until Natasha fell asleep.

She pressed a kiss to Natasha’s hair and drew the covers more tightly around them.

In the morning Natasha would wake her with hands slipping under her clothes and caressing her skin but for now Darcy was more than content to anchor her.

Everything else could wait for the morning.


End file.
